The Bible very clearly shows people from Mesopotamia and the Arabian Desert having camels early on, and we in fact know from other archaeological evidence in Iran (which doesn’t involve any Bible interpretation) that camels were domesticated long before Abraham’s time, which is about the first time camels are mentioned in the Bible. At least 1,000 years before Abraham, dromedary camels—the single hump ones—were domesticated, and Bactrian camels probably 500 years after that. So we know people in Iran did it, and it spread into Mesopotamia. We have good evidence from Mesopotamia that there were domesticated camels then.

What these archaeologists are doing, though, is when they read about somebody like Abraham having camels, they’re saying, “Aha! The Bible is saying that camels were widespread in Palestine during this period of time, and there’s no archaeological evidence for that.”

Well, indeed, there’s no archaeological evidence for widespread use of camels in Palestine at this time, but that’s not what the Bible is saying. What it is showing is that somebody who originally came from Mesopotamia, like Abraham, he did have some camels. And then the other mentions of camels in Genesis and in the early part of the Bible have to do with either people related to Abraham that were living in the Arabian Desert (for instance, the Ishmaelites…have camels when they come and buy Joseph and take him down to Egypt), or other peoples like that, associated with the Arabian Desert—the Amelekites…who live on the edge of the Arabian Desert are mentioned a number of times having camels. But there’s no mention of Israelites owning camels….

The Bible just doesn’t give any evidence for the assumption that these archaeologists are making that [the Bible says] there’s widespread use of domestic camels in Israel….

When asked for a response to the charge that “what we’re seeing here is obvious evidence that someone’s been tampering with the text and unwittingly gave themselves away by putting camels in Abraham’s possession”:

My response is just the opposite—that they show that they’re very accurate, because they confine it to people from Mesopotamia or the Arabian Peninsula. If this person was going to give himself away, you would expect [to see] him depicting the Canaanites having camels, or people like that. But he doesn’t say the Canaanites or the Phoenicians are making extensive use of camels.

And so by looking at the evidence in particular, and not just saying, “Well, Abraham has camels, so they must have been used all throughout Israel. Yeah, we don’t have any archaeological evidence for that”—well, that’s true, but if it’s only Abraham and people passing through that are using camels, well, then you wouldn’t expect to find a lot of camel bones there in the archaeological evidence during the period of Abraham or even later.

Again, it’s the problem of [the archaeologist’s] assumptions. He’s assuming that if camels are mentioned at all, the Bible must be wrong, rather than looking at the evidence and the distribution of where camels are mentioned, and then that reveals a lot more.

Michael, the host of Issues Etc. was posing the challenge that was in the New York Times for his guest to respond to. (The quote is the words of the host, but the sentiment expressed by the archaeologist in the New York Times.) So I don't know how the archaeologist would respond. Sorry that wasn't clear.

No, here's the argument Dr. Steinmann is making: According to the Bible, Abraham was born and grew up in a place where archaeological evidence indicates camels had already been domesticated for 1000 years. The people immediately around him at that time did have camels. And the only time the Bible mentions people having camels in the Palestine area, it's referring to people who came from an area where we know they had camels. Perhaps they brought camels with them, or perhaps, as they were people who were familiar with using camels, they might have purchased them later from a trader from an area that we know used camels.

Regardless, the Bible does not describe a widespread use of camels by the people of Palestine.

Perhaps Ron is not aware of the story of Abraham. In the story of the Bible (Genesis 12) Abraham is called by God to leave Mesopotamia and go on into Canaan. Abraham was apparently quite wealthy and had several flocks and herds when he left. He leaves Mesopotamia and goes on down into Canaan. He also travels at one point to Egypt (where there are camels). So it's entirely reasonable to assume that he would have had camels in his flocks and herds due to the fact that he comes from Mesopotamia, could have acquired them in Egypt, and traveled all over during the course of his lifetime. Not sure what the big drama is here.

> "Or are the camels decdended from camels brought hundreds of years ago?"

Mostly earlier than that. The Ishmaelites' camels would be ~200 years after Abraham came to Canaan.

Here's the list of Old Testament camel references:
http://www.esvbible.org/search/?excludes=&search=verses&matches=all&contains=camel*&submit=Search&filters=all&scope=1-39&order=reference

I'm seeing five categories of camels. The first two categories are the ones you're wondering about.

1.) The camels of Abraham, his children, and grandchildren. (That includes the camels of the "Ishmaelites", during the time of Abraham's great-grandchild Joseph.)
2.) Laban's camels. He's Abraham's son-in-law. It doesn't say he had camels before meeting Abraham.
3.) The camels of the Amalekites, and "other peoples like that, associated with the Arabian Desert".
4.) The camels that David interacted with. They're sort of in category 3. But it says he brought camels back to Gath, in Israel. (I'm less sure about this one, but it still doesn't look like these stories are indicating that camels were widespread. However, David is just decades before the "camel arrival time" claimed in these archaeological findings. So... The two seem consistent. This could even be how camels became widespread in Israel!)
5.) Job's camels. This is hard to analyze, since the Bible doesn't indicate a time & place for Job.

Archaeologists digging in modern day Israel came to a rabbi and said " We have proof that cell phones were used 2,000 years ago!" The rabbi asks "How is this possible?" Their response, "We've been digging for months and couldn't find any telephone poles, so people must have used cell phones back then."